Flash drives with songs to Bibles, activists send gifts to North Korea where Christmas is banned

While it is a well-established fact that Christmas is banned in the draconian nation of North Korea, a group of North Korean activists who are living outside the country are trying to send Christmas messages to the nation in a peculiar manner. According to Fox News, the activists are launching flash drives of holiday celebrations, Bible readings and Christmas cards into the Yellow Sea in bottles. They hope that these bottles will be carried by sea currents and reach the shores of the North Korean side of the peninsula. In regard to this, the group launched a campaign called “Operation Truth” which was modelled after the Berlin Airlift that was conducted to get critical help to the starving people of North Korea. 

"We should be doing everything we can to get information into North Korea by land, by sea and by air," Suzanne Scholte, chair of the Washington, D.C.-based North Korean Freedom Coalition told Fox News. Scholte noted that the group has conducted 17 launches of bottles towards North Korea. Each of these bottles contained rice, enough to feed a family of four for a week, as well as a Bible on a flash drive and a $1 bill. The group which took part in the operation also included nine North Korean escapees who mentioned that they dream of bringing freedom into their homeland, Fox News reported. 

Emotional gifts

During a conversation with Fox News, Scholte shared the Christmas message she wrote in one of the cards. “Christmas, which is celebrated all over the world on December 25th, marks the day when Jesus was born...Many of your ancestors also believed in Jesus,” the message obtained by Fox News reads. IN fact, in 1907, in Pyongyang, there were so many Christians who believed in Jesus that Pyongyang became known as a Holy City. But when Kim II Sung came to power, he wanted North Koreans to worship him as a god, and not the one true God. So, he killed many Christian leaders, sent others to political prison camps, or banished them. He did all he could to kill the followers of Jesus Christ..." Scholte furthered. 

Meanwhile, some of the Flash drives contained North Korean music in which the lyrics were changed from worshipping Kim Jong Un to worshipping God. Some of the Flash Drives also contained K-pop songs, the Books of Matthew and Mark, as well as recorded messages from several members of Congress touting freedom for the North Korean people. The American Congressmen who recorded their messages in the bottle were Senators Jim Risch and Tim Kaine, as well as Congressmen Michael McCaul and Gregory Meeks.